Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - The Process: Entrepreneurship Globally (Ep. 4)

Episode Date: June 15, 2018

On the 4th episode of The Process, Alex Fiance updates us on the latest happenings with Kairos and discuses the challenges they are currently facing: having to make investment decisions at a faster rate than ever before and the pressure that comes with it. We then get to learn from Andres Blumer and Bruno Ocampo-González, co-founders of Mi Águila, a company that is rethinking workforce transportation in Colombia and Latin America. Andres and Bruno believe their technology platform can help solve the transportation issues that plague their local market. They share what they believe are the most important qualities for any entrepreneur: persistence, emotional intelligence and self awareness and also discuss the challenges of building a company in Colombia._________________Subscribe to our Youtube Channel for more powerful conversations at the intersection of high performance, leadership, and meaning: https://www.youtube.com/c/FindingMasteryGet exclusive discounts and support our amazing sponsors! Go to: https://findingmastery.com/sponsors/Subscribe to the Finding Mastery newsletter for weekly high performance insights: https://www.findingmastery.com/newsletter Download Dr. Mike's Morning Mindset Routine! https://www.findingmastery.com/morningmindsetFollow us on Instagram, LinkedIn, and X.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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stay present and engaged with my thinking and writing. If you wanna slow down, if you wanna work smarter, I highly encourage you to check them out. Visit remarkable.com to learn more and grab your paper pro today. All right, welcome to The Process. Alex, great to connect with you again. How's it going, Mike? Yeah, it's great. I know you've been ripping and running and you've been in the trenches building your business. And so, you know, just as a quick

little recap, we've been through a lot in our three episodes that we've been together. And so just a quick little background. On the first episode, we got to some background of you and your company and how you guys formed your mission. And then on the second episode, we learned about Kairos and the process and the criteria for selecting companies and how they communicate internally to come to a decision, how you guys are doing that. And that was a great discussion about making hard decisions. And then in the last episode, we got a first person insight from one of your founders and it was rad. And we learned some really great things from Tim and his company. So for me, this has been a joy and I'm loving pulling back the curtain and learning

how you as a businessman are making decisions and how you're supporting other businesses to be able to grow as well. So, can you bring just diving deeper into the psyche of the entrepreneur. I think for us, as a relatively new fund, we're having to make decisions faster and faster than ever as more people learn about us. So the pace and the cadence of everything is changing fast. In terms of what we've been up to, I mean, there's a couple of things. We were named one of Entrepreneur's 100 Most Brilliant Companies last week, which is a really cool thing for our team because, you know, it reinforces that what we're doing is bigger than just venture capital. I love it.

So wait a minute. I'm not the first one to recognize that you're special? No, you were first. You were first. Oh, yeah, you're right. There you go. No, you guys are on it. Yeah, that's rad. Congratulations. And what did they recognize as being a brilliant company? What were the criteria? What were the things that they saw about you?

The specific context was building and funding solutions based on proven market needs as opposed to speculative potential needs or wants. We've talked about this in the first couple episodes. I think a very important part of investing is betting on where you think the future is going to go. Our thesis this whole time has been that a lot know, a lot of funds and, you know, the traditional groups from Silicon Valley are ignoring the really urgent pressing needs, which are also huge business opportunities, which is why we've themed a lot of we've done around, you know, existing needs, the cost of living, cost of childcare, care for the aging population, things like that. So I think the specific thing they were recognizing was that

focus on the urgent needs and kind of working backwards from that. That's awesome. Yeah. So instead of speculating that this is what I think country needs or then a global rhythm needs that you're basically saying, hey, listen, these are real needs and we're going to find people that have solutions for real needs. Exactly. Yep. Yep. And then where, okay, so a quick little thought, where did you identify that creating companies that had needs, real needs was a better business model than what many people do saying, Hey, I've got a great creative idea. I think people really like this. Why did you go the direction that you went?

I think we just saw a gap and also a really clear way to measure the efficacy of our time and the capital we're deploying, right? So, you know, as an example, you know, we've talked about the security deposit company, right? We co-founded a company that is getting rid of the upfront cost of rent, aka the security deposit. And now, you know, we can very clearly say that 50,000 units in New York no longer require a security deposit, which is millions of dollars back in a consumer's pocket. So for our team, it's a really clear way. In the investing world,

especially early stage investing, you really don't know whether you're going to get a financial return for five to eight years, right? That's the average. So for us to be able to quantify, you know, immediate impact and ROI on for the consumer, I think is a key part of our mission. And I think it's how we wanted to spend our time. Right? Okay, so so it's both it's it's like's like this mission allows you to be mission-minded. You snap into it wholeheartedly, it sounds like. Yeah, yeah. I think it's really important to be able to measure the value and impact of your time. And for all of our investors, the capital we're deploying. So in between the lines, we're able to report back with a lot of interesting metrics around how this is affecting the end consumer today. Okay.

So two of your criteria are that there's a prototype. So the founder has a prototype and the founder is all in. He or she and their team are all in, right? And then what are some of the other characteristics for successful entrepreneurship? And I know I've asked you this before, and I'd like to hear it again from you because when you articulate it, I just enjoy it. And so I feel like I'm watering seeds. Another repetition is good for me. Part of the intention here is to show, not tell, right? Which is why we're bringing new entrepreneurs onto every episode. I mean, I'll give you some quick context on who we'll talk to in a bit.

The founders' names are Bruno Ocampo and Andres Blumer. The company is called Miagula, translation My Eagle. They are a Colombian startup, right? And the reason I'm bringing them on, I'll let them explain what they do, but they're building a company in a heavily regulated market in an entrepreneurship ecosystem that does not have a lot of venture funds and angel investors and accelerators and incubators. So what they're doing is extremely hard. The industry is very difficult and the premise that they're even, you know, trying to build this company in Colombia is in itself a huge accomplishment, right? I mean, I think if you almost look back at, you know, even to 2008,

right? In my era growing up, you know, you had the Mark Zuckerbergs and it created a whole generation of other entrepreneurs saying, I could do it too. And they're one of the first people in Colombia to really start a company. So, you know, to answer your question, I think there's, you know, a major element of like leadership, uh, and grit and just persistence, right? Because it's not like people were pulling out, you know, the, the velvet carpet saying, please, please come start more startups in Columbia. Especially at the time when they started the company, which was three years ago. So yeah, I'll pause there. I mean, but you get the point. Yeah, it sounds bigger than, harder than many startup businesses because

you're now in a foreign country. That's not that challenging, but a foreign country that has regulations and practices that are not maybe favorable to startups. So that sounds more dangerous. That sounds higher risk. Is the reward bigger or is this something that you're saying, listen, all the variables that we look for for success are in place, so why not bet on them? Well, I mean, from an investment perspective, I think that we'll get more into what they're actually doing. But the market they're in is one that – it's one of the biggest markets in the world. There's plenty of M&A activity. We never doubted the case of what they're doing, the financial reward is probably similar, maybe a little smaller than the US for them.

I think there's a really interesting almost societal reward. If they are successful, and they've already been very successful. Um, but if, you know, if they have that big exit, they become that iconic transportation company, it will inspire a lot of future entrepreneurs to take the leap, right? It's, it's really interesting when you go internationally. Um, there's this major built in almost like institutionalized cultural fear of failure, right? Like in the US, you know, it's kind of an accepted, you know, idea that, you know, you need to fail in order to ultimately win, right? And there's in some of these entrepreneurial ecosystems, young people are really, really, really scared to fail, right? So what you need is companies like Miagula and role models like Bruno and Andres saying, you could do that too. I was 23 when I started this. I had no idea what I was doing. I've tackled government regulation, industry regulation, consumer demand, enterprise contracts. I can do this. You can do this too. There's actually a program in Chile where they will fly entrepreneurs to Santiago,

Chile, and essentially pay them to incubate their business out of Chile. They'll give them money, they'll give them space. And all that they ask is that they speak, these entrepreneurs speak to an audience of high school students. Because all that they're trying to do is this whole program is designed to just help people get over that you know fear of failure so yeah long-winded answer to your question but it's like it's it's really interesting when you go internationally and all these these places are really different i mean in places like singapore you know there's a ton of entrepreneurship then you go somewhere like buenos aires and you know it exists but it but it's just starting and you don't have that many proof points. Okay.

So for you right now, the last couple episodes we've been speaking to each other, you've been talking about that you're needing to make decisions faster. Is that because you are sitting on assets and you want to allocate those assets? Or is that because you've got an influx of folks coming in, so you've got more potential customers and you'd like to meet the demand? Why are you needing to make decisions faster? And then part two of that question is, how are you doing? And what can you teach on how you're doing? Yeah, I think we're making decisions faster because, yes, we have defined these problem spaces that we're, that we're investing in and founding companies in, you know, we're getting a lot of other types of referrals. So traditionally we've kind of run our own programs to get to know entrepreneurs,

help them at the beginning and, and help them build their companies over time. But, you know, we would get that bird's eye view of, you know, seeing these founders execute for six months, 12 months, 24 months. And these Miagula guys, you know, we've, they're part of of, you know, seeing these founders execute for six months, 12 months, 24 months. And these Miagula guys, you know, they're part of this, you know, we've known them for five plus years. I think now we're getting a lot of referrals saying, hey, you guys are tackling, you know, elder care, you should talk to this company. And, you know, when we meet the founder, you know, we don't have an existing relationship, We're working off of trust, social capital, referrals. And we need to know whether they can fit the Kairos ethos, whether there's someone we could work with long term. We need to figure all those things out faster.

Because they're raising capital or because their round is closing or because we just can't wait to start working with them. Remind me your position on why a company should take on capital. Is it for the relationships that you have? Is it for accelerated growth? I think those are the two easy answers. But can you get into the weeds a little bit deeper of why a company would benefit from taking on capital? And giving up, I don't know, 30%, 50% of their company.

Well, I mean, look, in our case, we're never trying to take a controlling interest or anything. So we really view ourselves as a strategic partner. We view ourselves as a company. And we say all of the aspects of the Kairos ecosystem come together through our capital in a sense. Capital is the medium to become partners with these companies because all of these companies, because it's a little bit of extra capital,

even if it just means they can make one hire faster. When we're co-founding a company, yeah, we care more about ownership percentage. We're writing a bigger check and it's a longer process. In the case of these quicker, faster co-investment decisions, it's really saying, hey, we want our whole ecosystem of industry leaders, government leaders, media, entrepreneurs to see you as a solution to a really important problem. We want to send a signal to the world that you are solving an important problem.

And for some people, that'll mean media. For some people, that'll just mean introductions. For other people, it will mean us actually getting operationally involved in the company. But I think the number one thing is that we're signaling to the world and this ecosystem that we spent 10 years building, hey, we care about this problem too. Here is the best solution we've found. Okay.

Okay. Super, super. And then the how are we doing question, I mean, I'll tell you what's been interesting, man. We are looking at investment spaces in areas where I personally have no experience. I mean, we've seen amazing, interesting solutions for kind of the cost and access to childcare. We've learned some really fascinating stats around how much people are spending on childcare and how hard it can be to find the right childcare to meet the schedule of the working parent, right? Obviously, to evaluate those solutions, you know, we need to be talking to other people. So, you know, we hosted an event

in New York with, you know, three founders who were building different parenting solutions, and the whole audience was parents. And it was awesome because, you know, we actually got to talk to the end customer. You know, We're looking at a women's health business, which is really a new take on everything from gynecology to future fertility planning. Clearly, if there was no diversity in the room, we would really have trouble evaluating that company. But we have a diverse team,

and we're looking really seriously at it., um, you know, I, we're, we're looking really seriously at it and I've been fascinated by what I've learned about, you know, the, the status quo and how horrible the consumer experience is. Um, but I never would have known that. Right. So, so it's two things, right? We're having, we're having to quickly get better at vetting whether something's really, you know, what we call a problem worth solving.

And we have to vet the founders faster because we may not know them. How about this? So two, two not directly related thoughts and questions here as I really want to get to your entrepreneur and learn from him as well. But one thought is when we make decisions for speed, sometimes we lose accuracy. We sacrifice accuracy, which is potentially catastrophic in some industries and certainly could be a problem for you. And so I want to sort through that just a little bit. And then the other is what if anxiety was at the center of a majority or healthy percent of physical disease as well as human ailment. And as a mental disorder, the challenges that people have, literally anxiety is considered a disordered mind, a mental disorder, is that people suffer from it. And because of that suffering, it's such a toxic ecosystem

internally and sometimes in their family structures and working relationships that it is one of the great accelerants for poor health and poor performance as humans. And so we're sorting out that we think one of the great human needs is to not just relieve the suffering from anxiety, a worried mind, an anxiously, chronically anxiously worried mind, but that it's also the governor for human potential. And to really take care of the planet, to take care of each other, and to take care of oneself requires a mind that can stay and live in the present moment in a disciplined, organized, thoughtful, caring way. So what if the need was to impact the anxiety that people suffer. How would you think about pitching that to a VC firm?

Yeah, yeah. I think it's a really interesting question. We started to see quite a few different businesses around mental health in some way, shape, or form. I think the question is separating the macro goal or thinking at a high level about how people should be feeling. Like, clearly, the world would be better if people had less anxiety. Separating that kind of macro concept from the experience of the everyday person. Because the question, you know, if you're marketing to somebody saying, you know, here's an app that

will help you, that will help you lower your anxiety. Like, is that an, is that enough of a lever to get them to buy or purchase or subscribe to something? I don't know. Right. So, so the question, I mean, and we've been, we've been looking at this, we've been trying to figure it out. The questions are like like where's where does within that consumer goal i want to get rid of my anxiety does it drive a purchasing decision for something that's not you know xanax right like honest and i i haven't really flushed it out we haven't really flushed it out you know but we're really interested in it but i think when you're asking how to pitch it to a vc it's really like, how does the consumer psychology of

this drive a purchasing decision? Yeah. For whatever the solution is. Yeah. That's a tricky one because it requires work or Xanax. No, I know. And we don't want it to be Xanax, right? I mean, yeah. So, I mean, keep us, we'd love to keep talking about it and see anything that you've seen. Yeah, I think that that sector of companies that are being funded for real problems, like the human condition is a real problem because anxious people are irritable and frustrated and they are not good custodians. Oftentimes, they, now let me say it differently, they struggle to be a custodian of mother nature. And man, we're burning this thing to the ground quickly. It feels that way. And so, yeah, I agree. Yeah. Those are some concerns I have. No, I, and I think, look, I told you this before we looked at one of the themes we initially came out with was workforce retraining. We really thought, okay, you know, if automation is coming down the pipe, you know, we're going to really need solutions that help people find the right new jobs and careers faster.

And what we found is when we started looking, and please, listeners, if you have anything in this space, let us know, we feel like the felt consumer pain is not that big right now. Automation has not had a huge effect right now. And maybe we were three, four years early, but we know this is going to be an issue, right? So that's one of those things where we're looking at it, we're thinking about it. It might take five years for us to find a solution, but we can take that long view. Awesome. Okay. And last thought about speed over accuracy. Are you aware of that dilemma? Yeah, of course. This is a good segue into calling in Bruno and Andres. But what we talked about at the end of the last episode, you kind of told us, you called it the dark triad.

You said, look for things that – here are some things you really want to avoid. I think by the end of this series, we'd love to have a framework for also the positive indicators that we should be looking for because that like, you know, yeah, we, we worry about that every day. Like did, did we have a blind spot that we missed in order to avoid missing out on a great company to partner with? So, you know, let's start looking at the positive indicators. Yeah. Let me give you one. Definitely, I think we have to gate out some of the dark stuff first. I feel you. The stuff that's going to be problematic. And then the assets that we're looking for, for sure, squarely bet on optimism.

And fundamental belief. Man, you're going to love Bruno. Yeah, fundamental belief that the future is going to work out, but not in a naive way. And then we want to make sure that they have the tools required to live with passion because we're betting on passion to help us guide us through times that we need to persevere. And so the two things that get in the way of passion are fatigue and anxiety, fear, fear and fatigue. So you got to bet, you got to do your diligence. I would say this is what I do, at least, right? I'm not saying you got to do anything is that I know this is good. Yeah. Yeah. I pull apart to make sure that they at least have

an understanding. And if you lead the horse to water, like how are you doing on managing your fatigue? They'll say, I'm doing great. You know, like you, you just got to sniff it out and sort it out. Like, like what are your daily rhythms look like? And if they say I'm a grinder and I sleep four hours a week and I'm proud of it or four hours a day and I'm proud of it, all the antennas should go up. Like that's not, that's not what we're trying to do. And then you think about, you give them scenarios to see if they, if when they're solving the problem, if they're over index or over concerned about what could go wrong, that's a, an anxious mindset. And then you can also look at physiological measures. Are they a chest breather?

Do they get too nervous and sweaty? And do their eyes dart around more than is comfortable if you're meeting them in person? You know, those are some indicators of physiological responses to fear as well. Man, we might need to start doing more video calls. Let's call in Bruno and Andres. Sounds great. Let's do it. I'm looking forward to meeting them.

So let's jump right into it. Let's learn right from two of the founders that you're funding, Bruno and Andres. Perfect. Yeah, I think they're on the line all the way from Colombia. You guys on the line? We're here loud and clear. Hello, everyone. Hello, hello.

All right. Okay, guys. So walk us through your company and what you're doing. And let us understand what some of the challenges are and what some of the visions are and what it's like. Literally, the purpose of this is for me to be connected and for us to be connected to the path of early entrepreneurship as we are students of that craft as well. So can you walk us through what you're doing, what your vision is and what it's like? Absolutely, guys. Well, first and foremost, thank you so much for having us here on the call. So for a quick overview, Miyagi was a transport and logistics technology company. And what we're focused on is solving mobility in Latin America through a unique type of strategy,

which is partnering with traditional local operators and empowering them through our technology. So what we've built is what we call a mobility marketplace. And what we do is we partner with existing supply partners to provide companies and individuals with a variety of different mobility solutions, which currently today is mostly focused on corporate personnel transportation and mass commuting services. So Bruno and I started this company about three and a half years ago or so. And I think we really started it because of three big problems.

The first one is, and it's something common you see throughout emerging markets in Latin America, is just an overall crippled mobility system. So for those people who don't know, and most people don't know this, Colombia is the third largest market in Latin America behind Mexico and Brazil, with a population of about 50 million people. And the big issue is that despite that population size, there's no functional mass transportation system. So Bogota, the capital with 10 million people, you know, just to put that in perspective, you can kind of think what New York might be like without a subway. And that's the reality that we live every day here in Bogota. And that's very common throughout major cities throughout Colombia. So that really sets the tone for a massive, massive mobility challenge,

both for the public sector, private sector, for companies, and for individuals on a daily basis. The second thing that we saw was that the B2C market for ride-hailing is an extremely competitive and saturated space. So all of the major players are here because they realize that the massive problem and therefore opportunity that exists. But what we realized was that B2C ride hailing services are not compliant with the security and the legal and the quality requirements of corporate customers. So that's really what Miyagi came out to set out to do.

How can we combine the legal model of a traditional and compliant transport company, but infuse it with technology? And much more so than building our own operations here, our approach has been, how do we collaborate with the local market, right? There's, you know, thousands of existing transport and logistics businesses in Colombia and in Latin America that are very well-run businesses, but that might not have technology. And our approach has always been, you know, how can we take advantage of that infrastructure, right? And Hundreds of thousands of currently licensed vehicles, really well-done companies that might not have technology and empower them using our tools and putting them onto the

marketplace, which is a substantially different strategy that you see, I think, from a lot of the B2C ride-hailing players where, you know, they're coming into countries and expanding with a very combative and very controversial and aggressive approach. So we've taken a different style of approach where we are partnering with local players and with the local government to bring the mobility sector in Colombia to the 23rd century. Okay. And when you say mobility, I just want to make sure mobility in the sport world means that I can move my joints well. And, but that's not what you're talking about. You're talking about people being able to be mobile in their communities. Right. And so you're talking about a transportation play where the challenge is if there's not a subway. So the subway is designed to get people around is, and like really to and from work is a kind of a main driver of the subway so is this a for people to get to work or is this for people to get to other communities you know to visit and friends like what is the primary purpose for the infrastructure that you're laying right right yeah great question mike and and you bring up a good point and mobility is a little bit of

a vague word that encompasses a lot of what we're trying to accomplish. But in reality, no one has a mobility problem. People have a getting them an alternative of getting to the office in a safe, comfortable, and cost-effective way, but also the means of moving around during the day for needs that, you know, might be related to work. So getting to meetings, going to the airport, and we provide a variety of different product or service offerings, everything from a high-end corporate taxi to a lower-end corporate taxi to mass commuting solutions for lower-level employees, as well as buses and vans and different connected and group commuting and moving around solutions. Okay. And how many employees do you have? Right now, we have about 40, between 40 and 45 employees or so here, and they're all based out of our headquartered office in Bogota, in the Columbia capital.

And how many folks to just start with? This is me wanting to geek out about the building process. Was it two or three founders that got together,, what did the origin sound like or look like? Yeah. So the, the origin, you know, there was a couple of people involved, but I think, you know, it was really Bruno and I that were dedicated full-time from the beginning. There were a couple other, you know, close friends, investors, uh, and advisors that were big evangelists and ambassadors for us, helping us with everything from clients to early fundraising, sharing this office space in the corner of their existing spot. And so there was definitely a lot of help, I think, from our personal relationships and family and friends to get things started. But it was Bruno and I when the company was founded. What prepares you guys to be CEOs, presidents? At what point do you run out of skill?

Maybe you say you don't, but at what point do you run out of founder? The founder syndrome is an issue, right? Where it's like, I can do it, I can do it, I can do it. And then all of a sudden it's like, whoa, it's bigger than than ever. You know, I'm not really prepared to make these types of decisions. And it's not a problem. But I'm wondering, at what point do you guys start to say, okay, once we reach threshold A, B, and C, we got to bring somebody else on. And maybe you say, nope, we're not doing that. We're riding this thing to the top of the hill and the bottom of the hill, whatever it takes, we're going to figure it out.

Right, right. Well, I think you touch on two different things here. I think the first one is, what are the characteristics or qualities that after this experience and others that I think both Bruno and I have had, do we consider to be the most important when it comes to entrepreneurship? others that I think both Bruno and I have had, you know, do we consider to be the most important when it comes to entrepreneurship? And I'll feel free to chime in here, Bruno, but for me, I think, you know, persistence is, persistence and just overall, you know, resilience and tenacity is the humongous part of entrepreneurship. And there tends to be a very volatile road, right, with high highs and low lows that tend to happen very dramatically, right?

So there's a lot less stability. So that's one core thing that comes to mind. I don't know anything. I mean, for me, I think I agree with Andres. The most important thing that an entrepreneur must have is emotional intelligence. And it's due to a roller coaster effect that we face on a daily basis. And being able to isolate problems and find solutions in the most difficult areas of the business, whether you don't have money to pay payroll or whether your product market fit is not there yet,

challenges to raise money, to hire great talent. So for us, you know, sitting in the first five, third years of the business, we've been able to have that discipline and emotional intelligence to face challenges on a daily basis. Absolutely. I think just to tie it full circle to the second part of your question, at what stage is the right stage to bring on other people? And I think that's another point, I think, on self-awareness, which is really key for an entrepreneur, right,

to be conscious and well aware of what your strengths are and what your weaknesses are. Everyone has weaknesses and that's fine. I think a big task of the entrepreneur is always partnering with people, be that a co-founder or even key executive hires along the way, that are precisely covering your weakness, your weak spots, right? It's that ability to be aware of where you're not so strong and be able to cover that weakness with new members of the team along the way. What was your most significant hire as you were building out? Is it an operations person? Is it like marketing sales? Is it, you know, I I'm naively asking that question,

but what are your, what were your key linchpin hires for you? Right, right. Well, I think the first thing that I think, you know, and I'll just, it's not not totally an answer to your question, but I think it's relevant to the conversation. It's that when you found a company, it's a very interesting exercise because you're kind of sitting around a table with a friend or a co-founder or maybe a group and you have to, you know, kind of decide, you know, who's going to do what. Right. And hopefully, you know, the people around the table are experienced enough to where, you know, they already know exactly what area they're going to be focused on versus, uh, versus the rest of the people. I think in the case of, of, of Bruno and I, you know, now that we're three, three and a half years into the business, we have a lot more clarity on the things that I do well and the things that he does well and the things that both of us don't do well. And we've organized our time accordingly on the responsibilities that belong to each of us accordingly along the way. But that clarity was not reached, I don't think, at the very beginning. And I think it was, you know, the more you can start out with the clarity

on that, I think the better position you'll be to scale quickly. And in our case now, you know, just to give you everyone a quick summary of how Bruno and I split up our time. You know, he tends to be more focused on the finance and the technology side, and I tend to be more focused on the operational side, which has to do with, you know, sales and driver side recruiting and that stuff, and also the actual operation itself. But at the end of the day, you know, we're pretty much always jumping around into all the teams. And I think, you know, once you get to 40 people, right, where it's where we're at now,

I think that the two of us, we start becoming, you know, a little bit short, short handed, I think, to be able to give proper oversight and supervision into all these different teams. I think some of the biggest key hire we've made has definitely been on the technology team and also on the growth side. Those have been the two big hires we've made. So head of growth, which is a great, interesting profile to have on the team. It's a girl from India who was previously working at Goldman Sachs in New York who's joined our team recently and also several key hires on the technology team, which is critical for us as well. So refreshing, Bruno, that you are in finance and managing that part and also value emotional intelligence. You're like a unicorn.

That's awesome. So my question for you guys is I have no idea. We have no idea the challenges of building a business in Colombia. And I can imagine, you know, I've been fortunate enough to travel quite a bit and I love Latin America. And I have a relatively good understanding of some of the challenges, I think. But I have no depth of understanding. So can you give us some of the perspectives on what it's like to build in your country? Wow. Yeah. No, plenty, plenty. Colombia is a beautiful country. I hope all the listeners take the time to come to Colombia during 2018.

It's definitely a beautiful country from the tourism aspect, but we're lacking a nascent and pretty new ecosystem when it comes to startups in Colombia. So as you can imagine, the biggest challenges for entrepreneurs in Colombia. So as you can imagine, the biggest challenge is for entrepreneurs in Colombia. It's raising capital from VC, venture capital investors in Latin America and in the United States, primarily because Colombia is known as an ecosystem for entrepreneurs. When we started three and a half years ago, we obviously had to provide funds and resources

from our families and from our own savings. And as we scaled and proved that our business was viable, we were able to attract capital from family offices in Colombia that did not know at the time anything about VC investment. So from the largest vehicle manufacturer in Colombia, to the largest exporters of flowers in Colombia, to an oil magnate in... so many businessmen that were working in traditional spaces. And we had to convince them that there was another way of building businesses that were scalable and really fast-paced. So it was really, really challenging at the beginning to raise money for Miagula. Fortunately, that has changed over the last couple of months, and I would say in 2017 and 2018,

that now we get approach from VCs from Latin America, even VCs from Colombia. So to me, that was the most significant challenges for our business? Yeah, and I would say the flip side of that, which is interesting, right? Definitely the early stage ecosystem makes access to capital a big challenge for any early stage entrepreneur. But by the same token, that early stage ecosystem also means that there's a lot less competition and a lot less saturation. So my perception, I'm half Colombian, half American, and I grew up in the States. We call them Gringombianos.

It's a patented term here in the Aguila. But I think when it comes to innovating in the States or in developed markets, you know, I think that, you know, the amount of really intelligent people with, you know, practically unlimited funds and investors with that appetite of aggressiveness and scalability, you know, provides for an extremely competitive ecosystem. I think it makes it really hard to differentiate and to set yourself, you know, apart from the pack. In Colombia, you can't, the same can't be said, right? I mean, there's, especially when we started this company, there's such a small amount of startups doing interesting work that, you know, if you are able

to secure the capital and you are able to get people to believe in your vision, you can make a really big splash really fast. And you can have a really big impact, I think, with a lot less resources than would be required doing the same type of thing in an emerging market like the U.S. I think it has advantages and disadvantages in that regard. Definitely, the ecosystem has been growing at an extremely rapid pace. That's changing, but there's still

a decade or more to go before it gets to a level of where the U.S. is at. I think the last point that I will make on challenges of building Miyagi-Laurent in the last three years is definitely the access to time. Our goal and our vision is to create a technology company

that is comparable at a technology level with companies in San Francisco, New York, Berlin, where it's the technology that they use. And the reality is that because of the lack of the access to startups here that have been created in the past, we do not have a significant talent pool for really innovative technology. So, namely, you know, all the universities have been catering and training really, you know, in some cases, outdated technologies. So, it has been a process of recruiting great and smart talent on, you know, a training program that goes anywhere from three to six months. So, they get up to speed in, you know, all the technologies from the back end to the front end that we use in our technology stack.

Okay, so let's see if you can dole out a little bit of guidance. This is how I'm seeing what you're doing, right? Which is you're up against a real need. You've got infrastructure challenges that are large. You've got governmental challenges and the way businesses work for funding and support that are in place. And you've got competing giants, global giants like Silicon Valley and Silicon Forest and Silicon Beach here in California. And so somebody who's got lots of passion, which I can tell you guys do, and you've got a clear vision, you've got good business savvy,

you've taken the leap to start a business. what guidance would you give somebody early on the path of entrepreneurship? Just if each of you could give one pearl or two pearls of wisdom, and I know how busy you guys are and ripping and running, so I want to honor our time, but if you could give us one or two pearls, it would be brilliant. Well, so many things come to mind. I think for me, it comes down to three words, product, market, fit. And, you know, it's less about starting a company, you know, and much more about solving a need, right? And if you're focused on, you know, really solving a need for a specific type of client

and you do a great job of that, the rest of the business can fall into place. There's going to be lots of mistakes along the way, but it's really just focusing on the problem you're solving and doing an incredible job, doing it 10 times better than the status quo, and achieving that product market fit, to me, is probably the most important thing to keep in mind for anyone who's interested in getting into entrepreneurship or just starting a company. I think for me, it's pretty much aligned with Andres' comments. It's about finding something that you truly love to solve. For us, transportation has been a huge challenge over the last 20 years.

And the country's and the region's progress is highly dependent on logistics and transportation issues in the years to come. So we found a specific problem that needed an immediate and critical solution so our country and our region can move forward. So finding something that you truly love and money will come as a consequence of your hard work, love, and passion for your business. Brilliant.

Hey, guys, I just want to interject real quick. Bruno, Dre, you guys are being, I think, very humble, but I think it's very important to tell the listeners everything that you've achieved. I think you've covered how many employees you have, but you guys have changed the lives of thousands of drivers. You've delivered hundreds of thousands of rides. I mean, please share a little bit about your traction

and then also just make sure that the audience knows how they can help because we have people listening from all over the world. Absolutely. I appreciate that. So, yeah, so everyone knows, you know, Miyagi-La was started about three, three and a half years ago or so. We've been in operations for just under three years now. So fast tracking and fast forwarding to where we're at today. We've got a run rate this year of close to $4 million in sales, which converted into pesos is about 12 billion pesos. So it's actually, there's a lot more transactions there than it makes it sound. But yes, we'll be closing with close to $4 million in sales in 2018.

There's over 700,000 rides and trips have been completed over our platform. We've been able to obtain three different nationwide transportation licenses that give us legal access into everything from, you know, taxis, yellow taxis, small cargo buses, vans, even school buses. So from a legal perspective, tons of room for growth on that end. And we're currently servicing about 200 corporate customers in six different cities. So I think those are the highlights. Those are the highlights. Brilliant. Okay, guys. So thank you for sharing and pulling back the curtain a little bit and answering a few questions I had. And then can you tell people where the best find you

and to connect with you if they're in Colombia, if they're international and would like to be part of your mission? Where's the best way for folks to find you? Absolutely. I guess it'd be reaching out to us personally, andresatmiagila.com

and durinoatmiagila.com. Andres is also famous in Instagram, so feel free to follow him and follow his crazy adventures. Okay, spell your company again. Spell the name of the company. The company is Miagila. It means my eagle in Spanish.

So M-I space Aguila, A-G-U-I-L-A. So please, yes, come find us down here. Search for us on Instagram. Feel free to reach out to any of us directly. Aside from Mi Aguila, we're both huge fans and passionate about Colombia and love to, you know, help bring people here and show them everything that this country has to offer. So if there's any way we can be helpful, we'd love to do so.

Awesome guys. Thanks so much for your time. Wishing you the best success. And this has been, this has been a great call for me. So I really appreciate it. Alex. Thank you. Thanks guys. Okay. Take care everyone. Okay. this has been a great call for me so i really appreciate it alex thank you thanks guys okay take care everyone okay bye all right thank you so much for diving into another episode of finding mastery with us our team loves creating this podcast and sharing these conversations with you we really appreciate you being part of this community and if you're enjoying the show the easiest no-cost way to support is to hit the subscribe or follow button wherever you're

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